Large lecture classes are frequently regarded as a necessary evil. Such classes 1 be offered in many colleges and universities to meet high student 2 with limited faculty resource, 3 teaching a large lecture class can be a 4 task. Lecture halls are 5 large, barren, and forbidding. It is difficult to get to know students. Students may seem bored in the 6 environment and may 7 read newspapers or even leave class in the middle of a lecture. Written work by the students seems out of the 8 .
Although the challenges of teaching a large lecture class are 9 , they are not insurmountable. The solution is to develop 10 methods of classroom instruction that can reduce, if not 11 , many of the difficulties 12 in the mass class. In fact, we have 13 at Kent State University teaching techniques which help make a large lecture class more like a small 14 .
An 15 but important benefit of teaching the course 16 this manner has involved the activities of the teaching assistants who help us mark students’ written work. The faculty instructor originally decided to ask the teaching assistants for help 17 this was the only practical way to 18 that all the papers could be evaluated. Now those 19 report enjoying their new status as "junior professors", gaining a very different 20 on college education by being on the other side of the desk, learning a great deal about the subject matter, and improving their own writing as a direct result of grading other students’ papers.